FACTORY GIRLS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2856, 9 December 1908, Page 53

FACTORY GIRLS.

r A DEACONESS'S IMPRESSIONS. (FKOM OUK OWN CORRESPONDENT.) CHRISTCHURCH, December 4. One of the deaconesses in Christchurch, ■ in speaking of her work to a newspaper reporter, had little but good to say of factory girls. They were a cheerful, harm- . less, and hardworking class, ehe said, and 1 with but few exceptions respectable, reputable, and praiseworthy members of .society. Of couree, they had their faults, the worst 6t them being that they spent the greater part of their earnings on un- ' serviceable dress ; but this, when all was said and done, was but a &mall thing. Tales were told, and frequently with much , circumstantial evidence of drinking among. I young women, but the had neither seen; ! it herself nor noted any of the effects that might be presumed to arise from it.^ The younger girls— girls with their hair down— had an annoying habit of parading i the streets in company with boys of their own age after darkness had fallen, but in. this, again, there was probably little harm. The chief drawback to factory life was that it did nothing to make those engaged in it fit for the duties of married life. Young women whose lives had been , divided between the school and the fac- - ■ tory found on marriage that they were • confronted with duties that were entirely new to them, and with difficulties the ' very exi.-tence of which they had never euspected. Being unable to look after their households, they fell into habits of extravagance, and, perhaps, became careless of results so far ns the care of children was concerned. They were sometimes absolutely ignorant, but various societies made it their business to teach them, and already the work done by them was beginning to bear fruit.

The Ya.ng-'tsc-Kiang, the famous muddy river of China, is one of the greatest of river', and its valle*y is the most denselypopulated and closely-cultivated river ba«ins oh tho globe. It crosses the whola Empire in its 3000-mile course to the eea. The river has a different name in almos* every province, and continually pours a flood of diluted mud through half its valley, colouring the ocean for a distance ; of several miles from land. As an example of the remarkable haul* of herrings sometimes taken .off Yarmouth, the case may be mentioned of a boat whose nets were too full to be all drawn, in. After taking 150,000 herrings, which sold for £195, the rest of the nets were handed .over. to.. another boat, which, aftejf taking 90,000 more, herrings, was obliged to allow the remainder of the nets to sink. The copper production of tho world amounted to 713,000 tons last year. OJ this the United States supplied 421,000 Un>«. The United Kingdom o»n- 60 por ci-nL of the mileajfo of submarine f.>\>'r-=, fc]n United State; 18 per cent., and Fiuuce t pei ceni.

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